The Ryen Russillo Podcast - Tales From the Couch: Lakers-Thunder and Sixers-Wizards. Plus, Bruce Feldman on CFB Power Five Scheduling Challenges.

Episode Date: August 6, 2020

Russillo shares his thoughts on the Lakers' loss to the Thunder on Wednesday night and on 76ers-Wizards (1:52) before talking with Bruce Feldman of Fox Sports and The Athletic about college football. The two discuss the new scheduling format for the Power Five conferences—the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, SEC, and PAC-12—as well as the #WeAreUnited group of college players voicing their concerns, and who may or may not sit out this season (20:07). Finally, Ryen answers a listener-submitted "Life Advice" question (58:45). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

today's episode of the ron rossola podcast on the ringer podcast network is brought to you by state farm just like basketball the game of life is unpredictable talk to a state farm agent and get a teammate who can help you navigate the unexpected here's something that's unpredictable the lakers are really bad at shooting the basketball sometimes. I mean, really bad. And we're going to talk about that a little bit. We've got some Tales from the Couch observations. So, get a teammate

who can help you navigate the unexpected. Talk to a State Farm agent today. Sports are finally back. Buffalo Wild Wings wants to let you know. And the only way to celebrate their return is with Buffalo Wild Wings, where the wings come in 24 sauces. Kyle, can you even name?

How many sauces can you name right now? Go. Asian thing, honey pepper. No, lemon pepper, honey garlic, all the different hot ones. Keep going. You're not doing as well with this as I thought. I'm a guy that sticks with what I like. Like, I'll do some garlic parm,

and then I'll do some hot, and then I'll do a couple really hot. That's really what I'm doing. I let the other people be adventurous around me. Do you work up? Do you start at like 135 of hots and get your way to the 225 of hots? I don't want to not enjoy them.

That's the thing. I don't want to i don't want to waste the wings this is my point like if it's too hot i'm not gonna i'm gonna eat somebody else's wings so yeah what was the first one you said asian zing yeah i promise you it's real that was the first one you came up with and you don't even eat it i was looking at the copy earlier i'm not gonna lie to you you were looking at the copy okay all right so anyway sports are back and there's no better way to watch than with buffalo wild wings the plan for today bruce feldman coming up in a few minutes from the athletic and college football's coverage on fox uh great stuff on the pac-12 we are united from but we're going to run

through all the major conferences and try to figure this whole deal out. By the way, those of you commending UConn for not playing, UConn's probably psyched they're not playing because they're broke and it cost them money. I think they would operate at a loss to even have a season. So I've seen some victory laps for UConn be like, oh, they did the right thing. I think their decision had much more to do

with their circumstances of what their current football situation is other than getting out if they were with a major conference UConn would have not canceled the season this week okay so there you go all right Kyle a little tired in the background do you have a uh oh shit would you have a Wednesday late one yeah we did hear it I'm just gonna call you out well I was gonna mute that if you didn't say anything nobody would have known yeah I'm just sensing you like today what did you do last night i stayed i went over to my grandparents house they just moved over into la so oh okay i thought you did something something else where you were there's nothing to do man you could stay up all night and not go to sleep and ruin your day but you know that's the only thing there is to do there's nowhere to go okay i'm just checking i don't know maybe you just didn't like that

buffalo wild wings read and you were like oh solo we're gonna get one of these rassilo pods today uh again nobody would have known if you didn't say anything yeah you know that's true but i mean i think i had i think i had like a really good riff a couple weeks ago where it was like i'm really going it was i was hitting all my strides and then i said something and you laugh in the middle of it like right at the closing important part so people love the kyle laugh track i personally didn't want it in that spot so i think that might be a little payback that might be just because yeah because the way i work is like i'll notice this one little thing and i'm gonna i'm never ever gonna forget that i'll wait 10 years here we go three weeks later here it is

verbally sucker punch you with something okay let's go uh tails from the couch a couple lessons here um because i didn't do just every game last night i wasn't going to sit there and bore myself with celtics nets that's for sure i've watched most of the games uh almost every game since it started wizards nets i'll admit to so you know i'm a little behind on the net stuff shout out to the ringer nba group the ringer social media people who ran the video of the kid i retweeted it so you can find it at ryan arisolo um do you know what the origin of that video is kyle where it's the kid i got to imagine we're talking eastern block here russia where he's being interviewed and then they dub over it.

Like, did you hear the Nets beat the Milwaukee bucks? Yeah. I don't know the origins of that. And he just starts free. It's like, he's in the concourse of some concert. It looks like he's had a few Pilsners,

maybe something heavier. And then it basically turns into the kids starts dancing out and freaking out because he's a huge Nets fan, but he had not known that they beat the Milwaukee Bucks when in fact that's not what the interview is about. So I just big shout out to the social media team doing it the right way. I enjoyed that one. Let's start with the Little Lakers just because they lost again.

And it wasn't just the Raptors game where you're like, man, Toronto is this good. I was curious to see what was going to happen with Oklahoma City and their guards. And there is a lot of problems in this one. Chris Paul led all scorers at 21 late. I do have my tails from the couch breakdown here. So maybe I'll go ahead and get into it because I actually want to make L.A. fans feel a little bit better. It's 81-71.

Waiters is on Paul. And even though Waiters is putting up some scoring, I think he still scares feel a little bit better. It's 81-71. Waiters is on Paul. And even though Waiters is putting up some scoring, I think he still scares me a little bit. And some of the scoring is him deciding, I'm just going to do this on my own. And that's what you're seeing right now. With teams that are trying to figure out their closing units, you are seeing guys who probably shouldn't be making big-time offensive decisions late in games deciding to do it because one, it can be an incredible amount of self-confidence, a.k.a. Dion Waiters. Or it can be, I'm going to seize this moment for me because I want these minutes and prove something as opposed to maybe playing within some kind of basketball system. as opposed to maybe playing within some kind of basketball system. It's a real thing that I've noticed here where the teams with some uncertainty there, you're seeing guys, and it's not even just as malicious as like,

I'm just going to take all the shots. It's I want to take this moment. I want to make a really big play here so that I'm part of the closing group moving forward because there are minutes to be obtained. So waiters on paul not a great deal there uh your man robertson back and ready to play who i don't love is a closing player but when you're up like okc was this entire time just because you can't shoot um he's on lebron and then you were looking as you as this lead got bigger and bigger it basically ends up like

a 20 points here in the fourth quarter. CP3 is looking to get Kuzma. They're looking to get him in the switch. The times Caruso would have him. I have one of those later in the game. It happened a couple of times. Caruso's on him. They just started up with a switch and then Chris Paul just goes to work.

The Lakers ended up in the foul penalty three minutes in, actually less than three minutes into the fourth quarter. So now the Thunder is shooting free throws the whole time. They ran. So now this can happen to you. You're like, oh, the Lakers aren't running anything. No, they do. They run some stuff and then it doesn't always work out. But they ran horns for LeBron, which means your guys are stationed at the elbows of the free throw line.

And you can run your action off of that. There's a million different things you can do. And they ran two screens for LeBron. They were both great screens as he was coming from the right side of the court back to the top of the key. And he got a great set of screens. They lost Robertson on him because they were just good screens. And LeBron made a great cut wide open three.

He misses it. Another Kyle Kuzma matchup with Chris Paul that didn't go the Lakers way. And Paul hits a step back jumper at that point and make a 92 73. There's really not anything to do. They bring 80 back in. And this is where waiters decides like, I I'm going to kind of try to do some of this stuff on my own. He actually had a really good drive and kick.

That was to Caruso for a wide open three. Really good shot. Caruso misses it. Waiters did end up with an and one. Made it 92-80, so they're back in this. Let's go. LeBron checks back into the game after his kind of fourth-quarter rest. Then you have L.A. go to zone,

and Oklahoma City immediately picked that apart. They got a big wing to catch at the free-throw line. Five-man for the Lakers comes up to defend the free throw line. And Adams just runs a little cut on the baseline. Catch at the pass layup. It's 96-80 after Shea strips Pope. Stripped him. So they're up 16 again.

So you're like, all right, Lakers, maybe this comeback isn't going to happen. I'll tell you right now, for the Baisley fans out there, he had an air ball last night that was so bad. He actually went 0 for 7 and 0 for 4 from 3 for the night in 22 minutes not your best production uh from him but he didn't want to shoot the three and he had to because everybody had scrambled in transition and he air balls the hell out of it and then he got one later on it was like man we're good um once it's 96 80 lebron comes out waiters screws up um and you know whatever the game's over danilo hits a three and that's kind of it and they take the stars out

like three minutes to go the reason i'm bringing up all this stuff is that the lakers shot 13.5 from three 35 overall and i know when it's this bad, it's almost as if we want these teams to be contrite. We want them to be remorseful. We want them to just fall on the sword. They almost, we almost want to be like, hey, we suck at shooting. We have no chance.

Are you happy now? Is that what you want to hear? And that's not really always the case because some of the stuff they did run, got them wide open shots and everybody just missed them so when the team says it's not always the truth but if you go back and you look at it and you go wait the lakers said they ran some good stuff they like their looks and that's good i mean these guys are always going to lean positive because that's the way you kind of have to do it you can't show up to the gym be like hey remember when we were good remember we were the one seat in the West? I mean, they are now.

It's clinched. But they're not going to start doubting themselves. LeBron had a weird quote after that one, and I'm going to bring it up because I just don't know if this is going to be anything else in the future. He said he and the Lakers were looking for rhythm on offense and then said, quote,

just some things that you can't control that's here that I really don't want to talk about that's off the floor. I don't know what that means. I don't know what that means, and I don't know if that's going to be him sending some kind of message. It does feel a little bit like

when you say, hey, I'm not going to bring it up, well, you just brought it up. You brought up this vague thing. But here are the facts. Anthony Davis has had two awful games and two amazing games, and I can't imagine he's going to keep playing this poorly at the low end of what he is.

Oklahoma City, the guard thing is a real problem for the Lakers, but I don't think the Lakers are going to shoot 15%. I don't think Anthony Davis, I mean, what did he end up with? 3-11, 4 shout out, 4 free throw attempts, 9 points. right, now I'm reading the box score, so moving on. I can poke holes in any of these top teams, but there's a real push

now with the week back where you go, ah, this Lakers team, kind of fraudulent. I'm not there. I'm not going to do that. And I did look at LeBron the last two years, his three-point shooting to begin the season. If you go back to 18-19 in October on six attempts, shot 27%, then 42% in November. You go back two years ago, he started the season at, let's see here, two years ago, he shot it well to start. But yeah, the beginning of this year, LeBron shot 29%. So he's in the 20s, the first handful of games

the last two years. I don't know if there's some connection to that, LeBron not shooting%. So he's in the 20s the first handful of games the last two years. I don't know if there's some connection to that. LeBron not shooting well coming back from this whole thing. Yeah, I know it doesn't look good. I know it's weird that this best team supposedly in the West can't figure out its rotation right now because of Bradley, because of Rondo. And I still wonder what they're going to do

with some of the smaller lineups that they want to go ahead and do. And we'll take it from there. But I'm more Clippers than I am Lakers, but I was before the whole thing started. But it's not like I'm just totally off Lakers. You're going to see more and more of that stuff happen here. But Davis needs to be better. He just needs to be better. I understood the Toronto stuff more so than his struggles against Oklahoma City. I thought Toronto did some really interesting things, and Davis would handle it better, say, if they were playing in the finals. But I was more frustrated, but I still think they got up in looks.

I just did. All right, let's do one Philadelphia thing here, too, as well. Philadelphia, I went back and did the San Antonio game, so let's pick it up five minutes. It's 116-114. Philly's up. Richardson hits a three. And then this is the little stuff here with Philadelphia.

And there's a lot to worry about with Philadelphia. That was a weird third quarter for you out there, right? Embiid upset. The Wizards on a run. Simmons heading the locker room. But the Sixers prevailed. They came back and swatted the Wizards away. But Embiid, who's a great passer, he gets a double on the left side

and he throws a pass through the paint. And shockingly, not shockingly, gets picked off. And you're like, oh, okay. And then Rudy Gay starts going crazy. Drive, jumper, makes it a one-point game. And then there's an Embiid possession where he's got a deep post,

but he's being fronted by Pirtle. And Simmons is standing like 10 feet in front of him, extended out from the hoop. He's looking straight at Embiid. Embiid's got his hands up. He's got the seal, but he's almost too deep for the pass. And you don't see fronting as much, at least in that situation. I actually just don't think you see fronting as much defensively on post play in general. But I haven't been tracking every post possession so i'll get to work on that simmons looks at him simmons then i believe text him and then writes a handwritten thank you card

to mbead's family for something that had happened that he felt like he should have gotten that card to him sooner but you know he just it was the thought as long as he got it there, didn't matter when. And then Simmons passes to him and Pearl deflects it. It's another turnover. Those are two plays where it's just those closing moments where you go, what do you guys look? What do you see right now?

What did you see? And everybody makes turnovers, these pocket passes that players make now to kind of split a double team is the double will stay with the ball handler and then the roll man. And then they just kind of like try to bounce past it through the guys all the time. It's really cool when it works. A lot of times it like hits the guy's feet. But anyway, those were really frustrating plays.

Then you've got Embiid who just moments later to prove how great of a passer he is. Harris cuts baseline behind the San Antonio defender. Embiid sees him. Harris finishes with the dunk. The number of baseline cuts that NBA players are losing guys on defensively, I can't believe how bad so many NBA guys. It's like boxing out, not feeling the body. To let somebody just blindly be behind you, and then you stop paying attention to them,

knowing that they're still sort of there, and it's your assignment. It's happening more and more in NBA games. Then there was a block charge on Purtle. Shockingly, the San Antonio crowd, and even Popovich, I mean, it was the San Antonio broadcast, and Popovich challenges, and they're like, oh yeah, that was definitely a charge.

They're going to overturn that one, and I'm on the couch going, it isn't. It's definitely not going to get overturned. It's definitely a block. It was a block. To go through this whole thing and be like, how are they in a game with San Antonio? The thing about San Antonio is incredible. They were hitting

incredible shots. Regay and DeRozan were awesome in this game. And then Simmons fouls DeRozan in transition by running him over from behind, and then he's out of the game, and it's tied. And you're like, here we go again with the Sixers. But to the Sixers' credit, I know that sounds amazing,

the stuff they were doing against the Pacers was way worse defensively than just the shots they were hit against them by San Antonio. Rudy Gay was hitting all-star level shots. DeRozan hit a couple that were nuts. So I'm not going to go like every single line here

and track the whole thing. But my favorite play from all of it is 129-127. Harris makes another great cut uh often and be double great read by and be and now dejante murray brings the ball down they're trying to get it to derosen derosen comes to meet him all the way inside and by the way like if you if you watch the game you're like i haven't heard dejante murray's name in a while you didn't he wasn't really a part of this which is what makes this next part so frustrating if you're a Spurs fan, is that DeJounte decides to clear everybody out, and he wants to ISO. And he ISOs Adam Bede one-on-one in the paint, and he got the floater

up. But it's not the shot you want there after Gay and DeRozan are going off. Murray wasn't really involved, but Murray decided, you know what? I'm actually going to do this now. I'm going to take over. It's DeJounte time. And that was a really bad decision by a young guard who it felt like in the moment was like, I got this. I'm going to go ahead and do it. And B fouled the other end and then hits one of them. And then we know that Shaq Milton hits three. There are all sorts of numbers. As I finished this Tales from the Couch briefing here, I looked at the 538 because I was kind of going back and look at some of the Oklahoma City stuff. Like how many people thought Oklahoma City wasn't going to make the playoffs? That was really surprising. And I understand their rebuild and everything. And I'm not just

doing that off of them beating the Lakers. But look, Chris Paul, fan number one over here, to see them be successful to me is not that surprising. I just don't really get it. But if you look at some of the number analytic projections here, the Lakers have the best odds of winning the finals. And then Philadelphia is fourth after the Clippers in Milwaukee with 11%. Put that in perspective,

Houston's fifth at 8%. Oklahoma City's less than 1%. And I understand the depth of the West, but Philadelphia's at 11% chance of winning the title. Oklahoma City's at less than 1%. I think those are just bad numbers. If a team is struggling or below what our expectations are from them,

but we have seen them be successful in the past, then that's okay. I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt if I've seen you do it before. Philadelphia has never done that. The best thing with this run is Kawhi's shot in a game seven of a second-round playoff game. That's the biggest Sixers accomplishment. So to watch them struggle, despite pulling out that game and then beating the Wizards, I don't know why they're going to be given the benefit of the doubt. And it's the same stuff

Celtics fans and blogs were coming at me all the time last year, where I was like, why do you guys just give the Celtics team the benefit of the doubt? Because of a hype video? Be careful of that, even though this year in the East, I think you're going to have to give belief into a team that has never really done it before. And I mean that as a new version of Toronto, not the version we saw when a title last year, before we get with Bruce Feldman, I want to tell you about our good friends from whoop. Whoop is a fitness wearable that I've been using for the last few months to track my training, sleep and recovery. And it's been awesome. The key to whoop is that you wearable that I've been using for the last few months to track my training, sleep, and recovery.

And it's been awesome. The key to Whoop is that you wear it all day long and never miss a beat. They have a really smart charging system where the battery pack slides right on top of the strap, so you never have to take it off to charge. You won't ever have to worry about losing a night of sleep or missing a workout. Whoop has been all over the news lately after the PGA Tour procured 1 000 straps for its golfers caddies and staff to help everyone at tournament stay safe throughout this pandemic whoop has been using respiratory rate to help members detect potential signs of illness before other symptoms develop with whoop you receive workout goals from its strain coach that pairs your recovery to a certain

strain level you can track your stages of sleep down to the minute each morning. Check out how much REM or deep sleep you get from the previous night and actually understand how well you're sleeping, not just how many hours you were in bed for. Whoop custom tailors its sleep recommendations to each member based on their baselines and how active they were during the day. With Whoop, you're really getting a personal trainer on your wrist that helps you learn your body

and make smarter lifestyle choices. For my listeners, Whoop is offering 15% off with the code RASILLO at checkout. Go to Whoop, that's Whoop, W-H-O-O-P.com. Enter RASILLO, R-U-S-S-I-L-L-O, at checkout to save 15%. Sleep better, recover faster, train smarter, optimize your performance with whoop let's talk some college ball a lot of news this week and one of my good friends neighbors bruce

feldman from the athletic and fox sports on college football coverage let's uh try to try to handle as much as this as we can i feel like we go forever but i know you have a life so let's start with just the biggest question the viability of a college football season as you see it right now and the differences we'll get into kind of the conference stuff. And then of course, we're going to talk about the, we are United stuff coming out of the PAC 12. So let's just start as we tape this on a Thursday morning out in the West coast. What do you think happens this season? I think they're going to try and play, Ryan. I mean, I think everything we've seen, the people who are in the decision-making part of it, whether it's the ADs, the conference commissioners, slash leading up to the college presidents,

they are going to want to try to show that they have made every effort to play. And having these schedules in place with a lot of flexibility, you know, look, we saw baseball with the Cardinals and Marlins issues. There's been a lot of challenges, which is not surprising. They're not in a bubble, right? And so colleges have tried to set up that scheduling process in place. Teams are already in training camp as we're taping this. Ohio State started today because they actually have a game that is going to be a Thursday

night Big Ten game on September 3rd, right? And so I think they're going to do everything they can to try and play. Here's the part that I think is really concerning for them, which is the Big Ten ended up delaying its announcement about the schedule a day. The timing was not great because over the course of that 36 hour window before that you had Northwestern having to push pause on their workouts because of COVID you had Michigan State posting significant positive test numbers you also had probably the most disturbing part of it was a story of an Indiana freshman offensive lineman. His mom had been on social media and had posted in a parent's group some really disturbing experiences that her son had had where he had to be rushed to the ER.

And she talked about how she worried that he may have real heart issues related to COVID. And then after that, it had come out that Rutgers had 28 players and three coaches who tested positive. And so if these power five commissioners, they know the particulars. Most of these schools we do not know about. Yeah, a handful of them will tell you how many have tested positive, how many are negative, but we don't know any of the severity if people have real symptoms or had real struggles, but they know that information. So the feeling is if they feel comfortable that there haven't been the one kid, Brady Feeney at Indiana, is the exception to this, then I think that, you know what, unless there's going

to be a major surge when the regular students come back, which is possible now, um, then, Hey, they're going to, you know, let's keep our fingers crossed and let's try to have a season and see where it goes. Yeah. Throughout all of this. Um, you know, I know there've been kind of these, these lines divided where there's media members that go like, why are people rooting for sports to not come back and then the people that maybe are asking more questions and think that sports shouldn't come back are saying i'm not rooting for this and then everybody kind of goes back and forth i think it's all kind of our like preconceived ideas of where everybody's heads at as we all kind of consume each other's content but i've just never had a problem with anyone trying to put together a plan knowing knowing that the plan may not work,

but this feels a lot more like baseball. Uh, and not just because of the bubble thing. Like I was talking with somebody the other day, like, Oh, you know, baseball really screwed this up.

Basketball has done a great job. You're like, well, it's not apples to apples, you know, it's less players, it's less teams and baseball essentially like whether it was all player motivated or people behind the scenes,

they brought up the bubble idea and then it got shot down and they're trying to do this normally. So it's a little different in not playing seven games a week and traveling a couple of times in that week, like baseball is just doing in a very normal version of a shorter season. This, this feels like every conference and I, again,

I'm not blaming them for going, let's put the plan in place and then kind of see where we're at in a couple of weeks, but it feels just far more uncertain than anything that we've seen, you know, from, from basketball and soccer. Right. And I think that's a key point, right? In terms of one of the challenges that schools have found as players have come back in college football is there have, they feel like they're fine in the facility. The issue has come up where it's a bunch of guys went to a pool party or guys went to a bar or, and this has happened at a couple of schools, guys got together, played Madden. Normally,

a bunch of guys going to somebody's dorm room or apartment to play Madden is about as tame as you get, right? But now in this environment, it's super problematic, right? And so one of the trainers I talked to in the SEC a few days ago had said, and this is before their schedule announcement, but I think this actually factored into it because a lot of the trainers talk and those guys are really at the, they're kind of at the ground zero of this, of knowing what's really happening and having the real, real intel. So, you know what, we feel like we have a better handle on this now because their players understand the severity of it. They kind of are taking it more seriously now. There were two things that gave them, and the trainers all talk amongst themselves, you know, amongst their peers at other schools. Two things that really were noteworthy were,

what's going to happen when the regular students come back? Because they're probably not going to take it as seriously, right? Because they're not worried about being quarantined and missing two games because people aren't going to be testing them. And a lot of them may be asymptomatic, but they could still have it and they could still spread it. So that was the concern about what's going to be when the regular students come back. And I think that was a big factor in why the SEC decided, hey, we're going to push back or start till late September. But another element, too, is there are a lot of coaches and staffers who are pre-existing conditions people and also maybe 60 plus. Now that's not the majority of coaches,

but that's enough to give people inside college athletics concern because they are much more at risk, the numbers show, than they would be if they're a college athlete. So I think the things that are, they are definitely keeping an eye on Major League Baseball. And so if you're a big college football fan, if you're any kind of sports fan, if you cover the

sport, you got to be keeping your fingers crossed that baseball can keep on track. Cause I, you know, I've watched a lot of hockey in the last couple of days, watched a ton of basketball. It's like those, as you said, are in different situations. And, and the one big distinction beyond just, and I had a coach bring this up to me the night of the Marlins outbreak, was so in baseball, you have a sport that socially distance itself a lot more than at least football will. You have much, you have smaller rosters, but also they're professionals. College football players are not. And that's a hard thing for college presidents to get around if major league baseball decides it can't play, or if there are some really, really bad stories that get connected to this in terms of, when I say bad stories, I mean like the kid at

Indiana. I'm not talking about what somebody tweets out or a column or something like that. Okay. So if we go individually by the conferences, at this point right now, Okay, so if we go individually by the conferences, at this point right now, we're looking at the Big Ten, where it's all conference games. And I think some people had questions like, why would Ohio State and Michigan be October 24th? But now looking at it, it makes all the sense in the world. They're trying to protect that game as much as they possibly can, because there's already three delays installed. Not even just for the Big Ten, but most of the conferences and how they're trying to schedule out the potential conference championship game. But it feels like the Big Ten there,

although Wisconsin fans have to be thrilled with the way that they've added to that schedule because Wisconsin kind of misses everybody. Well, they didn't miss Rutgers. Their crossover game is Rutgers, not Ohio State or Penn State. So it's good to be Barry Alvarez. That's right. And the great thing about Rutgers, as we all or Penn State. So it's good to be Barry Alvarez. That's right.

And the great thing about Rutgers, as we all know, is you have the New York footprint for the media coverage for your conference, which has been incredibly rewarding. All right. ACC, this one's a little different. They're going 10 games plus the non-conference, but the home game has to be played, I believe, in your home state. So that's why Navy, Notre Dame's not happening.

They're going to play Western Michigan. By the way, I don't understand. I understand. Okay. Let me, let me say it this way. I understand people hate Notre Dame. Okay, fine. Going back to the BCS part of it, where it was like, Hey, it feels like they get preferential treatment. They get smashed against Alabama. They get smashed in their playoff game. It's a little bit like the anti Ohio state thing after they had gotten crushed in two national championship games where it's like, you know, if you're actually good enough to get to this level, but then you're run off the field where everybody's watching. It's actually worse than just kind of going like eight and five where nobody's really paying attention to your losses. Yeah, exactly. That's the feeling. Yeah. But this angst from other college football fans about Notre Dame not being in a conference or, you know, like actually media members going, well, you know, they should have to play in a car. Who cares? Why is Notre Dame? I just I don't understand. I can understand not liking them because of your own fan allegiance to whatever other campus. I don't understand how Notre Dame's independent status seems to ruin people's day. Let other things bother you more. I think it's a hater element

because I think a lot of people feel like it's been romanticized and forced on them. So it's the old school version of the hater thing. Because it's been pedestaled, I want to see it fall. And look, I'll be honest, when BYU decided to go independent, and BYU has a unique, you know, appeal as well, because it's obviously tied into a religion, and it's not just regional, it's all over the world. The difference I would argue for why Notre Dame's, and granted, Notre Dame has more of a football history. But the biggest thing is, people will tune in to watch Notre Dame,, and granted, Notre Dame has more of a football history, but the biggest thing is people will tune in to watch Notre Dame

and a lot of them will tune in because they're hoping to see them lose. You don't get that same part with like BYU. A lot of people, unless maybe you're a Utah fan, are not tuning in just to say, hey, I want to see them lose. There's a lot of people who have that, like they rejoice in seeing Clemson blow uh blow them off the field

or what happened in the man thai teo team with alabama you know that i think that's part of added to the it was going through a lot though so yeah it there was a lot of stuff that's that is true um bearing the lead on but that's the thing but here's here's to me is notre dame has clung to being the unique brand. Hey, we're the only ones who have this or whatnot. But you still can't argue that, like, oh, Notre Dame's not very good. Notre Dame's had a bunch of top 10 teams under Brian Kelly. Yeah, they're good.

They're actually a good program. Yeah. That's the thing. And they've had a really, you know what? And under Kelly, like, they've had a lot of big time guys, you know, whether it's the Ronnie Stanleys or you name the offensive lineman, Quentin Nelson. It's not like this is a fluky team

that's just a bunch of media people are hyping them up. I mean, they've had really good players that have proven it in the NFL. It's just, there's a difference between being really good and some of these teams, whether it was the LSU team last year or the Clemson and Alabama teams that won titles it's like those teams are loaded and they're on a roll it's like it's hard to win a national title doesn't mean Notre Dame's not

really good and I think it was a coup for the ACC to make this work to get Notre Dame you know on board for this season yeah like I just I'm first of all with you on the talent part of it i don't think they've ever had this consistent level of talent um since lou holtz really what brian brings in and there's there's even guys that end up in the nfl where you go oh yeah yeah that guy was like a third rounder out of notre dame and the guy has like a you know eight year career in the league so kelly from a talent standpoint but you're right a lot of this is you know nobody who hates grows up hating Notre Dame goes hey you know what let's be fair about the Irish you know let's let's be fair I just the whole conference thing to me is such a waste of time to get upset about okay all

right so moving on um so that eliminates the SEC ACC games the SEC is going 10 conference games I've actually liked a couple of things that have been pointed out in some of the concerns, whether it was the waiver thing, where the commissioner of the SEC was like, hey, stop having your coaches do this. It's not valid. It would never hold up. So stop doing this. Some of the insurance stuff that I've heard about, where the SEC is like, look, despite the depleted pool of available money for insurance, we're going to figure out a way to go ahead and cover some of this. But as far as the actual schedule of this, was the SEC thrilled to add all those extra games because they're clearly still fighting the nine conference game thing that we've seen in

the other conferences? Yeah. I mean, towards that end, I think the evidence would be they're not going to stick with this. I'd be shocked if they stuck with this after the pandemic. This is kind of a one-time only, hey, we're going to jam in to make this work. The ACC had kind of clamped down on some of those rivalry games, whether it's a Louisville-Kentucky game or Clemson-South Carolina. The ACC already moved. By the way, just on the ACC thing. So the ACC is starting two weeks earlier than the SEC. They're starting on the 12th.

One other thing is when the ACC did their deal, coaches found out about it 12 minutes before it got announced. That is an incredibly tight time. Meaning they kept this so under wraps. And it was like, here it is. You know, it was like, okay. Whereas these other things with the SEC, the Big Ten, there was more discussion about it. Like the Big Ten, I had heard from, there was a coach's meeting the week before it got out about some assistants were being told by their head coaches, hey, don't even worry about scouting the non-conference opponents.

coaches, hey, don't even worry about scouting the non-conference opponents. So I think it's interesting to hear some of the backroom politics and how these things kind of all came to be and how they tried to keep some stuff under wraps as best they could. Because look, a lot of the partners in these, quote unquote, kind of got screwed on big money games for them that just got shoved out the window because we're in a pandemic. Okay, what's the Big 12 doing? The Big 12 still has to sort out some stuff. Like, they're the more wild card here in this. Like, they always would play everybody in week zero there, right? So that's the part I think that's a little different in terms of they are trying to show

their constituents, hey, we're getting on board as soon as possible. We are doing everything we think we can. They are playing a nine plus one because obviously they don't have as many conference members. And so they're going to have that one non-conference opponent similar to the ACC. But their anticipated start date, they're going to tell you, is mid-September. So it's kind of more in line with the ACC at this point. So how are they going to figure out the rest of the non-conference stuff, though? I think some of this stuff is working out the deals of who they can line up.

Because you've got to remember, there aren't that many dance partners out there, right? You can pull from certainly some of the group of five. But look at an ACC. The ACC is Virginia Tech can play a Liberty. That's in their state. Florida State will scoop up a Samford. These are as Samford, at least, as an FCS opponent. So I think as the,

as the big 12 kind of does that, my hunch is you would have a better sense of where the big 12 is going to be sorting this stuff out by, um, probably by the middle of this month, which actually is probably only within a week or so before you get a real crystallized picture of what a TV's calendar is going to, what a TV schedule is really going to look like. Okay, let's talk Pac-12, and this is going to lead to some other stuff. The Pac-12, I've always kind of thought like Big Ten fans arguing about, you should do it the right way and do it nine games, where meanwhile, no one ever cared about when the Pac-10 was doing it forever. I've always thought that's kind of funny how Big Ten fans act like they invented

nine conference game schedule and fight for it so hard now. But the Pac-12, 10 conference games, and I would say geographically located in some areas that may be less likely to want to bring football back on top of... Let's keep it at the conference and then we'll talk about the We Are United news that came out a few days ago. Right. So a couple of things to keep in mind. We can talk about, we're both living in Southern California. There was a lot of squabbling inside the PAC-12 meetings, according to my sources, about when they could start, because some of the California schools, and there's four of them, may not even be allowed

to work out in the building and do some of the stuff that everybody else is able to start. And eventually the Pac-12 just kind of was like, you know what, guys, sorry, I can't help you. You're going to have to do the best you can. And so what they have done, because there's really not going to be quite a level playing field in the Pac-12 in terms of the start date, at least in terms of the training start date, is, hey, we're going to jam in like week one on our calendar. We're going to have UCLA-USC. It's a great rivalry game. The other end of that, though, is, from what I'm told, they did that knowing, you know what, that game may not happen on time because both schools may not be ready to play it. So we can stick it back late in the year

when it's normally played. So, you know, the operative word and as it related to the Big Ten schedule, they refer to it as their Jenga model. Everything you hear from these conference commissioners and these people on the decision-making side is about, quote-unquote, flexibility to kind of shuffle the schedule around as needed. But yeah, my three cents on this from talking to people around the league is that if somebody else, most notably like, say, the Big Ten decided, you know what, our presidents don't feel like it's safe for our players to play, we're not doing doing this the pac-12 would make its decision and follow suit in a heartbeat that's what i've always heard really so the yeah the domino effect of this is going to be they don't want to be first ryan but they'll gladly be second yeah i don't understand that

stuff either you know i've never understood that like the pr part of it where you go because there was always this back and forth with baseball and basketball where i would hear stuff where one of the leagues wanted the other one to announce their return first and you're like you know how irrelevant that stuff becomes like people don't even remember people don't even remember after the fact i mean they'll remember if college football didn't happen but they're not going to remember the specific timelines of like, oh, the season fell apart because the Pac-12 ruined it for everybody. You know, science is going to be the thing that prevents this happening. So I don't, I don't know if you have any further on that, but I, you know, I mean, just, just, yeah, I think you're right. And it's like, my analogy to this is from talking to people for a

while over the pandemic is people hear about predictions, but, you know, as it relates to this thing, it's a virus, it's different. If it's like, if it's a weather forecast and you're, you know, whatever your weather forecaster in your local towns predicts, you know, a sunny day or a tornado, what you and I do has no effect on it. It's going to happen. But in terms of a pandemic, with a virus, it's a lot more related to the human behavior and how things handle it. So I think that adds to it. And that's what I think a lot of people are, like I said, with the SEC, they're trying to figure out, okay, what's going to happen when the attitudes of regular students come back?

Okay, what's really going on with the rest of the news surrounding the Pac-12? Bruce will have that. But as we mentioned at the top, Buffalo Wild Wings, because sports are finally back, and the only way to celebrate the return is with Buffalo Wild Wings Asian Zing, perhaps. There's no fans in the crowd, but that doesn't mean the real fans aren't at home, cheering louder than ever from the edge of their seat and they can still get that sports bar feeling with wings from b-dubs the only thing as exciting as sports being back is crushing boneless or traditional wings at home in any of our 24 sauces

oh there it is like original buffalo wild or asian zing boom that's why asian zing was on your mind so order a wing bundle and get traditional wings and boneless wings and fries for the house because sports are back and there's no better way to watch than with Buffalo Wild Wings. So order at buffalowildwings.com or

through the Buffalo Wild Wings app because now more than ever we need sports and sports needs us. At participating locations for a limited time bundles only for takeout or delivery through buffalo wild wings app or website not valid with any other offer that leads us to the pac-12 we are united push from a couple days ago made its way through social media a lot of other college football players other parts of the country were like hey man we're with you and then as we look through the demands a lot of other college football players, other parts of the country were like, hey, man, we're with you.

And then as we look through the demands, a lot of demands make a lot of sense. Some of the demands don't make any sense. But like I've said many times in the negotiation, kind of see where you're at. Some of the things had already been resolved that were part of the demands. So organizationally, I wondered kind of where they were at. And then when I find out it's 12 players from eight teams and some of the administrators are like, we never even heard from these guys before any of this stuff happened. What do we know now about this and how many college football players it speaks for in relation to an actual boycott that we could see this fall? Well, I think it's more than the number initially. And I honestly, yeah, big story on this, on the athletic on Sunday, where we talked to a ton of people involved in it.

And one of the things that, you know, one of my takeaways from this, from our reporting is the guy behind this, um, really one of the driving forces, a guy named Ramogi Huma, who is a former UCLA football player from years back. And if the name sounds at all familiar to some sports fans, because Ramogi Huma was connected to the Kane-Coulter, the old Northwestern quarterback who about six years ago, there was a unionization movement. Initially, it felt like there was a lot more traction to it. And then it seemed like it came out that there was really less movement behind it than it was portrayed to be. And we're talking number of players.

Like at first we thought it was the entire Northwestern football team that wanted to unionize essentially and become employees. And then it wasn't. Right. Yes. And then there was a couple of a couple of months ago. And you probably remember this living out here, there was a story that blew up in the LA Times about UCLA and player demands. And then it got a lot of attention. And then we started looking at it and asking around, and it wasn't quite what it appeared.

In terms of some of the player demands, those things were actually already lined up to be in place at ucla anyway and on top of it uh there was players who said all these players signed this letter and when you talk to people including i had dorian thompson robinson who's probably the the face of the program right now their star quarterback he was like that's not what i signed and there was no intentions of getting this to the LA Times. We were just going to send, put this out to the coaches. And so it was an element where it felt a little bit like a bait and switch. And again, so now Ramogi's got this group. And I'm not saying like what you said, I think there's a lot of valid points that are in it so I don't want to diminish that but one thing that is is you know come true with this or come is I talked to a Pac-12 administrator for this story and he was like

you know I think you're going to see a lot of these guys support each other but not in the way that they're willing to sit out meaning Panaywell, who's the best player in the conference, the best offensive lineman in the country at Oregon, he tweeted the hashtag and has tweeted about it on Sunday. One of his teammates, who's the best player was in the initial movement, Javon Holland, the defensive back at Oregon, he's very engaged in the initial movement, Javon Holland's a defensive back at Oregon. He's very engaged in the movement. The question is going to be, is Panay Sewell going to opt out and not play because of this? Are all the players who said, who put it on social media, retweeted it, retweeted their teammates, is that what they're going to do?

It doesn't seem like it's quite that case case because you know you you get some really thoughtful discussion in here like elijah mold and really good cornerback at washington and he was like talked about on twitter this has been a long time coming and he fully supports the sentiment of the boycott and then you start to get into like parsing and he was like but there's a few things that i cannot get on board with on this. And so that's where I think there's, it's murky. And I think it's, I think in the way Rimogi Huma and the people connected to this on the leadership side of it have wanted to see how much momentum it could get. They didn't take a player vote because if a player vote on Saturday had said, yeah,

87 players aren't going to opt out and three are, we're going to know how big the movement is. And I think with social media, part of the things are how much power is behind this. And when it's a little less determined, that impacts the momentum it has. Cause I talked to PAC 12 coaches who said, you know, I think these guys have, have a lot of really good valid points behind this. Um, and then there's a few other ones that are like, no, that's not realistic, but the majority is a good discourse. So we'll see how the PAC 12 and Larry Scott, they're engaging in it and see how, how much further it goes and what's going to be. I mean, this is a very fluid subject, just like we're talking about big picture wise with the pandemic.

It's really important to kind of understand the numbers and exactly like what the goal is here. And it's not to be dismissive to the movement. It's to just truly understand it, kind of like you're talking about here. Because I mean, I could retweet something from a friend, a colleague, and I may not even love the segment. I may not even love the opinion, but I'm just doing it to be supportive. And I can imagine if I were a college athlete, I would think of the things that I feel like I'm being wrong.

I'm reading about it nonstop the last few years. And you're like, yeah, that's right. Like, let's figure this thing out and have every intention of playing. out and have every intention of playing so when i look at the role of the players here is it is it to be just disruptors and threaten something because on social media it plays out like man the pac-12 season's like totally in jeopardy this is unbelievable and then you start digging through it and you go or like a bunch of guys tweeted stuff, you know, because I still think despite what some would believe, I still think the majority of these guys, just like the people who are going to make money on it from television, that the kids actually do want to

go ahead and play and that their scholarships already, I believe it's, they're already safe. And if they decide they don't want to play and they want to go home, their scholarship is still going to be there for them, which I know is one of the demands. So there can be these really misleading moments where you think something is such a big deal and is putting something in jeopardy. And then you realize now it's just, it trended for a day and people have moved on already.

Right. And I think the hard part to decipher on this is it probably means different things to a lot of the people involved in it. For Ramogi Huma, I'm sure he sees, and look, some of this is a negotiation part where I'm sure he doesn't think no way they're going to get everything on here or 99% of it. But I think there's probably things that he sees as somebody who has been fighting an uphill battle on this for a long time, I don't know, probably two decades now, that he sees these are the opportunities we're looking at. Whereas some other players involved who are 18, 19, 20 years old, who are looking at it going, okay, these are

things that are important to me. They're important to my family. I think I've had these discussions with my buddies on the team. And those are things I'm going to fight for. But I'm not going to be the one to say, yeah, I don't know about this 50-50 revenue share. Or I had this discussion with our head coach and he's explained to me that's actually not how endowments work. I think it's a hard thing to be a college athlete in the middle of this where there's a lot of stuff you want to get on board with, and you're just trying to pick it apart,

and you know your words, you know people are watching what you're saying, because look, I mean, on a lesser scale, think about this. If you put something out there, and you're in a, not whether it's a moment of crisis or something, but you're asking for colleagues' support,

you're taking note of who has your back and who doesn't, like what you were saying before. You know, I mean, on a lesser scale to this, like when I was going through everything with the Free Bruce stuff, you know, 10 years ago at ESPN, I knew, and I didn't know everybody, but I kind of knew who of my colleagues, you know, had my back and who I felt like didn't, right? And it's almost like, you know, you're making these calculations about, you know, what's something worth. Now, I'm not saying, oh, this person said they're going to quit their job because of me to be supportive, but you just, you're, I feel like it's almost human nature for a lot of us to make those

determinations about who has my back and what that means and so then you take it into oh well this person retweeted it so they must be on board and they're added to that and the reality is like since this thing's come out i know that you know at first there was no usc representative now one of the usc defensive backs is engaged in this but you know and it's a part of it but i don't know to how how far that actually you know leads and that's the thing that i guess we're still going to just keep an eye on it and see where it goes along with many other things that are connected to it because like the big 10 players uh two days later or three days later, came out with their own list, which seemed to be a lot less grandiose, maybe, in terms of that and more on the just healthcare aspect of it. And I think a lot of people looked at it and go, you know what, that's very realistic and plausible to be engaged in.

Yeah, just think if you would ask 20, maybe even as recent as 10 years ago, hey, we want healthcare coverage for six years after we're done playing, you would have gotten laughed out of the room. And now, even though that's a huge asset, and I could understand administrators going, wait, but the support for it is like, all right, things can, as we know throughout history, things can really change on what's kind of accepted as a reasonable request. And that reasonable request could have seemed as impossible years ago. So I understand part of this whole thing. By the way, the free Bruce thing for people to understand, Bruce wrote a book with Mike Leach and then Leach went at ESPN, um, pretty hard. And then it ended up. Greg James was in it. It got all sideways.

Can I tell the Ryan story since you don't work at ESPN anymore? Well, it depends. Wait a minute. When we talked on the phone... I can tell it. You can delete it. So I'm getting a lot of support from people I know as everything's blowing up. And I just remembered I got a text from you

saying like, I can't believe those assholes would do this or something or something like that. And I don't think it was the most, uh, the softest language you use, which I appreciate it. But I also wanted to,

I wasn't responding to most of the messages at that point, but that one, I was like, Hey Ryan, this is an ESPN phone. You just texted me on. You want to take the high road on this one? Yeah. I don't know. I'm this one? Yeah, I don't know.

I'm not really good at it. I don't know. It just didn't make a lot of sense to me. Just did... I don't know. Did anybody threaten to quit on your behalf? No. That was probably a lie.

The weird part was, at some point, it was happening so fast that I couldn't really keep up with it. I was dealing with... I don't know. My head was all over the place. But at some point some it was happening so fast that i couldn't really keep up with it and i was dealing you know i'm trying to i don't know my head was all over the place but like at one point somebody was like jason whitlock changed his twitter avatar to you and i was like i did his radio show in kansas city like one day i've never met him he's never met me i appreciate it but it's just like journalists man yeah you kind of wonder where it's going so no i don't think anybody um i don't think anybody...

They may have wanted to fire you after they monitored that text, but that was not it. No, but look, just so people understand what it was, you were given the green light to go ahead and write the book, and then Leach gets into it with Craig James, and it turns into this whole thing, and then you end up losing your job. Yeah, that's kind of it in a nutshell right and so it just became one of these things that it happened during the ESPYs I was working on a 30 for 30 with Joe Tess about Alabama and Auburn and it just it just like exploded in a way that I couldn't you know like you said I mean I'd gotten permission for the book and then you know it became a Craig James versus Mike Leach showdown. And I think I got, and it got ended up dragged into it. And I'm glad that, you know, it, it worked, you know,

worked out the way it did. The crazy thing is almost everybody who I kind of ended up sideways with at ESPN, they're all gone from the company at this point now. Yeah, so I just would like to emphasize that part of it too, that when I referenced that. Because I knew what was going on. I knew what I'd heard. I'm like, I can't. Even if I liked the person making the decision, didn't like the person making the decision,

I just couldn't understand. How do you give the guy the okay? And then everybody just freaks. They're like, all right, well, let's get rid of Bruce. You're like, what? How does that make any sense? And the stupid part about it is, what, two years later, when Leach has a book out,

we're doing promos for it on ESPN Radio. So I go, so Bruce lost his job, but now we're just like, ah, you know, that was in the past, everybody's cool. Like, Craig is gone. That thing didn't make any sense. It didn't make any sense, and that's why I think there was such a push at the time

for the free Bruce. Is there anybody who didn't back you that you hate now still that you want um there was a couple of there was a couple of people there that it wasn't just that they didn't back me i remember there's one point where it was like wait a minute you're trying to tell people that you know i'm really good friends with something that they know is not the truth you're trying to spin that out there like i was not thrilled with that part of it yeah it got turned into like you did this whole book behind the scenes and didn't tell anybody and like that's just not the way a book works especially for somebody like you who had been with the company for such a long time that i'm like wait this is this is what is being sold right now like this yeah it was crazy because i remember i was back in new york like i don't know it's like

four months before the book came out and i had had these discussions and they were, because I'd given them the heads up, this is going to be problematic here. And they, I don't know, it just was out of my hands at that point. But it's weird because that was social media in whatever was 2011. And I feel like it's way different now. But it's weird to be in the middle of something. And I know you can relate to this on several fronts, but to be in the middle of something. And I know you can relate to this on several fronts, but to be in the middle of something when you're literally feeling like you're watching your own kind of funeral and seeing how people are talking about you and everything.

And the crazy way it started, like first it was like some player agent had reached out to me and said, I heard what's going on. I'm like, how would you know? Like, I mean, I was just on a phone call a little bit ago. And then a reporter who's still at espn who i'm friendly with had said hey just want to let you know i you know heard such and such and i went to bat for you and i was just like how did

these people know this you know it just like i think maybe i didn't grasp how like how quick things get out inside Bristol. And I think that added to it. Oh, yeah. No, that's the weird part. There's a funny story Lugenbill once told me. Tommy Lugenbill once told me about he went away, I guess, hunting for a weekend. And he came back.

And this was in the day of answering machines. And he goes, I have 20 messages and I'm listening to it. Hey, Tom, so sorry about what happened. I know your heart was in, you know, there was like five in a row. And he was like, oh my God, dad's dead. You know, like he thought his dad had died. Well, what he didn't realize was until he got like into message eight was that the XFL, the first XFL, which he and his dad were coaching in, had folded. And they had just won it. I guess they won the first league championship and just folded. But here he is listening to all these somber messages and they're all kind of cryptic.

He's thinking, oh my God, my dad died when I was away on the hunting trip. So he was like, you know, that's the weird way of, you know, you can get a little bit of, what's the old school game? Pass it on or password or whatever the heck it was where you just kind of like the message gets kind of priced right no that's not it's definitely not it i'm just kidding okay you can follow our man bruce feldman at bruce feldman cfb uh all right thanks. We'll have this out today. Appreciate it. Always a pleasure. Thank you, Ryan. You want details? Bye.

I drive a Ferrari. 355 Cabriolet. What's up? I have a ridiculous house in the South Fork. I have every toy you could possibly imagine. And best of all, kids, I am liquid. So, now you know what's possible.

Let me tell you what's required. Okay, before we close it out here, a little life advice. And I think we got one that's a little bit different here. We could probably just end this every week going, hey, yeah, 20s, they're tough. You're not really quite sure. It'll get better. Boom. Just hit that.

Have that as a drop after every pod. All right. This is from pat because love the pod after listening to the infamous baller boomer people still mr eight figures people will not stop emailing about him um the life advice for a few weeks back i have a suggestion for our low eight-figure friend. Use your free time and means to build a lasting legacy. It doesn't sound like he can go full Bobby Axelrod and slap his name on a building just yet. So the next best thing is to mentor young minds and help others get to where he is. I'm guessing it would be way more engaging for him than unpacking donated oranges at a food bank or whatever.

By the way, really good advice. I think that's good. But we had the other therapist check in earlier this week saying this guy may just be a really deep-seated loner who has dependency issues. So I don't know what to do with Mr. A-Figure, but I hope you still listen. Shout out. You're a legend.

People can't stop talking about you. Tons of emails about him. Okay, this guy actually does have a question, though. Background, I'm 30, living in San Francisco, working in tech. That's you? And have achieved a small level of success, but have never really had anyone further up the ladder invest in me. Oh, okay. Despite a number of people sitting me down and saying, quote, you have a lot of potential. I think we covered that on a different life podcast where you may have a ton of potential or you may have a manager who thinks you're slacking and they say that to motivate you, or you have a manager who heard that from somebody else once and now they say it to everyone else. Continuing the email, for whatever reason,

I've been unsuccessful in getting any amount of a relationship with more established folks than that. I love reading biographies. And one of the commonalities of the master of the universe types is that they generally had a series of mentors pulling them up the ranks. It was really apparent in David Geffen's biography, where his whole life basically trading a mentor in for a new, more successful one. I'm not sure what role mentorship has played in your life other than you mentoring Bill Simmons. Curious to hear your take. What's funny is when I got that one this morning from you,

I thought it meant, because I immediately was like, yeah, I haven't really had the mentor thing in anything I've done. I didn't really think about it. That's the thing about being younger is you're not going to have it all covered. And then somebody else is going to have some kind of plan. And you're going to go, holy shit. How did you even know that? They go, I have an older brother.

I have this cousin that summers whatever. And he told me, I have one friend who hadn't worked for a really long time after college and everybody loved him so it wasn't like he was some deadbeat there we go oh this guy's never going to amount to anything we were just kind of a little surprised like hey is that guy just not work like what's his deal and so finally one time i was like hey what's your deal what's going on he's like you know i'm just kind of staying around, keeping things in the mix, a little bit of this, a little bit of that. He goes, you know, he's like, I really feel like at some point I'll probably just meet some guy that likes me, who's got his shit together and, you know, has some investments and he'll bring me along and then maybe he'll get

me in on a deal. And, you know, that'll just kind of take it from there. Like that was his whole plan that he was going to meet an older, very successful, rich guy who'd done some, you know that'll just kind of take it from there like that was this whole plan that he was going to meet an older very successful rich guy who'd done some you know whether it was a real estate deal or funding some other thing that he would just befriend him and then that guy would like get two percent or something yeah it was just there you go there you go yeah and i just i thought to myself i go is that the dumbest plan or the best plan like i really didn't know i really didn't know and by the way everything worked out for this guy uh and a lot of it had more to do with him making some some good decisions after that but i'm not saying it's uh it's impossible i think the mentoring thing i wish i had done a better job not with on-air people

in getting to know them but with uh people behind the scenes but i've talked about that before i did a bad job of that at espn i just would be like all right you know whatever if you want to talk to me you can talk to me um i didn't think i didn't want to waste your time by coming over and be like hey let's map out my next five years like hey what do you think about this i heard a story about somebody that i worked with and invited the president of the company to the wedding and i was was like, are you even close with them? They're like, no, but you never know. Like, what would be better than that?

I would go, I would be embarrassed to send the invite. Word. But that's more of a me problem. You know, why not? So I would really push. If you feel like you're at this tech firm, I don't know your deal. You know what I mean? It could be that nobody's mentored you because they don't like you or that you're not as good at this. Or I'm just

trying to be totally honest here. Or you're just kind of quiet. No one's ever really reached out. Like don't wait for the other person to reach out. Don't wait for the person to magically show up at your door one day and solve all of your problems and make your life better. Like it's really on you. And you can definitely screw it up too. You can be really annoying about it. I mean, I've had a few younger guys reach out to me where I was like, okay, this guy sucks. He won't leave me alone. And I don't want to deal with this anymore.

And I'll just kind of move on. So I wouldn't say I'm the greatest of the mentors that are out there. But there's something to be said for you making the effort on your own no matter what business you're in to just say hey this is what i kind of want to do this is where my head's out how how can i get there how can i achieve some of these things because if you don't if no one's ever doing it for you and that's how you feel about your job then it's up to you to go ahead

and do it um as far as like trading them out i can't imagine how great that must be when you just have to dump your mentor for a better, more successful mentor. You're like, hey, look, this has been a nice little run, but I have somebody far more successful that can help out my life a lot more. So I'm not going to be asking you for advice anymore. So peace. I've never done that stuff. I've never had to swap them all out. Yeah. I would say if you're a construction worker, don't worry about this stuff as much there's a lot of stuff where we get these emails about work and that's why I think everybody should have to work construction because you've showed up

to the site and just said well I'm not quite sure about the pitch of this roof okay leave I was really hoping that maybe you guys could mentor me we could map out like a five year plan because I don't want to just be in concrete alright yeah you can fucking beat it.

So construction work will... I just think it makes you kind of like, oh, maybe my feelings don't need to be heard every lunch break on the job site here today. Everybody have a great weekend. Bill and I are back on Sunday as well. Please subscribe, rate, and review to the Ryan Russillo podcast, part of the Ringer Podcast Network. And that's it. Yeah, we'll talk to you guys on Sunday. Thanks. Thank you.